The City of Johannesburg is working on a request to declare a local state of disaster after the explosion seven days ago in Lilian Ngoyi (formerly Bree) Street.
On Wednesday, Johannesburg city manager Floyd Brink said they have started compiling a report to the provincial disaster management centre (PMDC).
“The declaration of the disaster is critical to allow us to assess the impact of the explosion on infrastructure and to cost the rehabilitation work required,” Brink said.
“To classify the disaster in line with the act and to declare the disaster once the outlined processes have been concluded, we have mandated the disaster management centre to commence the processes and to finalise a report for submission to the PDMC within the next seven days.
“There has also been a restoration of feeder cables under the collapsed road surface and the street is energised.
“Investigations are still inconclusive on the cause of the explosion and what may have ignited the gas or the source of the gas in the underground tunnels.
“We have established a team of engineers from various entities of the city to begin planning and scoping the work we will need to undertake.”
The water main on Lillian Ngoyi and Joubert streets has been repaired and water restored to the affected block. The water main on Lillian Ngoyi and Loveday streets was repaired but leaked due to alignment issues. The work is expected to be completed on Wednesday.
“It is evident that in rehabilitating the road surface and underground tunnels we will have to implement new standards of how we manage and lay out underground service lines and connections. Among the anomalies, we have gas pipelines running parallel to water pipes.
“Everywhere in the city there’s theft and vandalism. When we sent in our drones there was a level of vandalism we detected. We are depending on the cameras on the drones we send down there. We don’t know what’s happening underground.”
Brink said through there was no conclusion on which type of gas exploded, methane was ruled out.
On sending repair equipment to the scene, Brink said: “It’s going to be difficult to send in heavy equipment as there’s a possibility of collapse.”
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